Prophylactic Approach to Solving Environmental Problems of the Mining Industry in Linkage With Energy Consumption

ABSTRACT. Existing technologies for developing ore deposits lead to irrational energy costs for delivering empty rock as part of the ore to the surface, while the content of the target component in the extracted raw material can be hundredths of a percent, not to mention the environmental damage from placing dump waste in the open air. A process of underground processing of rock mass is proposed, based on grinding of ore in an artificial liquid with intermediate density between the target and waste components. Herewith ballast minerals are automatically freed from intergrowths with valuable components by floating up during milling. This prevents the irrational expenditure of most of the energy on unjustified grinding of the main constituent of ore. As a result of the proposed treatment, when mining ores of most metals, the weight of the rock mass brought to the surface decreases by 7...10 times, whereas when mining gold, this reduction can reach hundred-fold. Thus, the reduction of the volume of cargo lifted onto the earth's surface is the second factor in reducing energy costs in mining.